I love the whole Halloween theme even if it is not such a big deal over here in the Land Down Under.

So even though there are other themes I could have picked like birthdays (Mine was the 16th) or spring, I chose to stick to the All Hallows eve theme

here it is:

I started off with Dusty Concord and Frayed Burlap distress stains for my sky and dirt.

And of course used Tim’s favorite technique spritz and flick (I kinda love it to)

Then used versamark watermark ink pad to cover about 1/4 of the dirt at a time, poured over vintage photo distress embossing powder (am sure you all know how to use embossing powder if not give me a heads up and I will add a tutorial) heated and repeated this till I had the lot covered, rubbed it to get rid of the release crystals and that is how I created my dirt.

All the die cuts are Cuttlebug cut and emboss dies though I only Embossed the Halloween sign.

I painted the Graves Black (all dies are cut from some recycled packaging) then added some glossy accents and covered them in my fav black glitter Martha Stewarts Black Onyx.

I hand cut the moon, painted it in Cool Peri paint dabber, dried it, added on a smidge of black alcohol ink to add a bit of texture but it was a bit much so went over it with Pearl Mixative and the result is what you see on my page (Have to say I really love my skull moon)

The skull I left the natural colour of the packaging, added a teeny bit of black soot distress paint around the edges covered in glossy accents and glittered in Rock Candy Dry Stickles.

The Halloween sign I painted with Ripe Persimmon Distress stain and added some black soot distress paint and a spritz or two of water to give it that sort of spooky look.

then using one of my fav Inkadinkado stamps the corner spiderweb inked in Black soot Distress ink and stamped into the page corners, then I spritzed with water to give them that sort of faded in smudgy look.

Lastly I took some Liquid pearls and added in the RIP, October (admittedly not very well I need to practice writing with these I think) and smudged a little at the bottom of the graves to look a bit like grass.

And thats it there isn’t anymore. As Tim’s post was all about glitter I did do all the graves glittered and the Skull I also had a lot of fun

Have to say really love the Distress embossing powder dirt will certainly use it again.

This year challenging myself to do 12 coasters instead of tags has been yes a challenge. Coasters are much smaller than the tags that are usually used. They are just 4″ squares.

It is with a fondness and some sadness though that I say goodbye to the 12 tags of 2012 and reveal the piece of wall art I created with my coasters.

I know that this year will see even more creativity and I already have my idea ready and waiting for the first tag of 2013 (where would we be without Mr Holtz’s monthly inspiration).

Yes I added a little to some of the tags, an image here, a little glitter there, nothing major bar the complete reboot of my Febuary (oops almost typed fabuary) coaster on which I did keep two of my original elements just gave them a better backdrop as it were.

So here it is the very Last installment of my 12 coasters of 2012 the finished Canvas (painted in antique linen crackle paint, with letters cut out of sizzix love letters strip alphabet die, stamped with coffe bean ink on hero arts Kraft cs and all stuck on with matt multi medium) It truly has been a year of creativity and I for one am very glad that with the exception of April I managed to get all my coasters uploaded and shared on time.

Yes another Cybercrop Challenge. This we 2″ square box was my starting point it was a halloween themed mini otp challenge

I created this box and made a flower using Donna Salazar’s Rose Creations Dies (yep one of my fav things to enter my stash this year)

Then after I had embossed the box and added the flower and watch parts I had an idea how awesome would a flower look with watch parts in its center so that is what I did. I have to say I love how this turned out though embossing the box was the hardest part.

This project has been almost a month in the making. It all started with an amazing (and I do mean AMAZING see her tribute to Mr Poe here)Toni’s Cupboard of Curiosities

So Toni then set us a Halloween Cyber Crop challenge to create our own spooktacular box/cupboard of curiosities. Unfortunately I do not own any configurations or other such things so Used a Twiddleybitz 6″x 6″ shadow box instead.

sadly I bought two of these some time ago at a craft show and when I went to paint and assemble the second one found out it was missing a vital piece that means I could not put it together or use it. So I had to go back to the drawing board. I had already had decided on what to use the other one for, had it painted and assembled as well. It was originally painted a metallic blue with silver paint sponged over the top to represent clouds (I forgot to take a photo of it this way sorry about that)

here is some of the elements I started with the other bottles and vials are from the Tim Holtz Ideaology range, a Tim Holtz Tree (misted in black soot and covered in Martha Stewart black onyx and white gold glitters), A miniature paper sack (its a die by Memory box), a skull from a halloween garland of skeletons as well as some of the bones, Satin, Grungeboard, glitter, a painting from this amazing artist Jim Smeltz who sells his work in miniature prints here, and the candles are actually hand made by me but more on that later.

here is the Box before it was Alcohol inked and filled (The ‘wallpaper’ is from Primas Firefly 6×6 paper pad)

It was a lot of fun creating my icky vials and bottles of things and such a shame that in the finished product you just do not see the bottom of the ‘blood’ vial. Both it and the bottle that looks like slime exploded out of it are a mix of Alcohol Ink and triple thick mixed and heated (Note please use tweezers or tongs and be careful cause it will bubble up and over it takes a bit of time and a few tries and cool downs to get it all to work) with a heat gun. I love how they turned out.

My bottle of eyes is actually sticky back pearl rhinestones in different sizes stuck together and then put in the bottle and covered with glossy accents. I swirled them all around with a long needle I have for bearmaking I love how it turned out.

Here is a pic of my project Alcohol inked. It was a process that took time and a couple of days to get so I was happy with the effect. I also covered the gargoyles ball with Black Onyx glitter just to give it a bit of a different look to the stone ball.

Here is a pic of what it was like just sort of sussing out where things may or may not end up

this is the right side of the bottom of the Shadow box, as you can see I used the smallest of the Idea-o-logy trees misted it in black soot distress mist (that I made myself) then covered it in black onyx glitter about 2-3 times shaking off the excess and allowing it to dry everytime. It dissappeared to much into the whole blackness of the inside of the box so I added over some white gold glitter as well which sort of looks like a mystical snow (at some point I am hoping to get a wee pentagram in a circle or some such for the top of the tree I just have not seen what I am looking for yet) The bones are from a halloween skeleton I took appart and painted with snow cap paint dabber (I wanted them to have more of a stark look rather than the aged look of the skull). I died some pink satin with Red Pepper Colour Wash and made the Witches hat out of grungeboard, and the cape as well (I will get some pics later with the little spider on the cape it just looks so much better than the cape on its own)

Now to the lefthand side of the bottom of the box.
here is where I used the skull, all my bottles and vials, the Witches broom and also a wee handmade paper bag filled with scolls (the scrolls are made from watercolour paper. Misted with a combination of mists including a pearl one as I wanted them to have a mystical type shimmer but still look really old I have a ton of these left as I went a smidge overboard) The edges are inked in Vintage Photo Distress ink and I misted them again to get it to bleed.

The next thing is a close up of my little candles and I can not believe I actually made these myself from scratch. I melted a beeswax candle I had in a container with my heat gun (would suggest a saucepan and a stove but I was in a hurry and not in need of that much wax) First you run your wick into the melted wax and roll it between your fingers this makes the wick thinner. Then dip the wick into your wax (I actually used cranberry alcohol ink in the wax be warned it does go a bit odd but overnight the colour came out and I love how my candles look now they were very pale and took a while for the colour to show through) Until you are happy with their thickness. I also rolled them in my fingers a bit to get the shape right. At this stage do not worry if they are too long. The best thing about the candelabra is that it sits up on it’s own. I then dipped the bottom of the candles in wax and set them into the candelabra. lit them to get them to be close to even, and used the wee tea light container I had been melting wax in to drip/pour over wax to make the candles look like they had been around for a while dripping. I also needed to light the candles again to get rid of the wax that covered over the wicks. It was an evenings work but I am so stoked with how they turned out. Here is a close up of them.

The finishing touch was the Amazing Art Print (I also got a lovely card, another print and a sticker on the back of the envelope all that can be used in future projects)

And here it is My Witches House Shadow Box (Promise I will get a pic with my glittery black spider tomorrow I just wanted to share this project now that it is done though I can’t promise I will not add to it over time)

and thats it for now 🙂 I had so much fun doing this and though it did not turn out as gruesome as I had wanted it to I would happily tackle another such project with enthusiasm.

Well I did not win any of the october challenges at JBS last month but did win one of the Cyber Crop ones with this little card I knocked up.

I used the New Rock Candy Loose glitter over some glossy accents for the ghosts and My fav Martha Stewart glitter Black Onyx for the boarders. I also tried my hand at making a leaft cluster or whatever they are called for the first time just for an added bit of interest.